Today Jerry washed the car and the camper before we left for our exploring trip. I did a little more on the English paper piecing project I have been working on...black and white fabrics.
We headed off down the road and the first thing we ran into was a picture perfect tunnel just before entering the town of Keystone.
Then as we were reading the menu to determine our lunch spot, a giant of a man was wandering in the middle of the road trying to get us to visit a show that was about to begin. He was 7' 2" tall. Another tourist walking by us had just crossed the street in front of him and said he was looking about belly button height when he passed him. He sure could crack the whip!
Then we walked through the touristy parts of town and then we were off exploring.
The road took us right by Mt. Rushmore so we took more pictures in the daylight hours. Next we found Rt 16 again and hung a left. Shortly thereafter we hung another left onto SD87. Beautiful rock formations and a tunnel. This tunnel was not made for big rigs not even small rigs like ours. However, we are in the HHR so all is good. Then we get to a road that says "Needles Highway-Scenic Drive". So off we go. We stop at the gate to Custer State Park and leave a few dollars with them and get a pass good until the end of the month. I guess that is okay. Then we go down the road and those few dollars are more than worth it to see the sights and the tunnels (one we thought was nearly too tight for the little car and it's mirrors). The vistas changed along the way from sheer rock, to long views across the Black Hills, and turns that were posted as 5 MPH - 10 MPH. Wow, some of those roads didn't seem large enough to accommodate the motorcycles so we weren't sure how we were getting through it. We stopped @ Mt Coolidge General Store and took a short shopping break....well potty break, I shopped, and Jerry sat out in a shady spot reading a book. Then off again we went. We came to a decision point in the road and Jerry took the Wildlife loop. At this point we had seen nil for anything other than tourists and cars and motorcycles. We were beginning to think we would find nothing on this loop and then we came upon the Pronghorns, then one bison bull walking along the road until we drove past and then he meandered over into the middle of the road and kept walking down the hill behind us. Well okay we thought......then several more miles down the road we topped a knoll and there were a couple hundred buffalo! They were on both sides of the roads. Mommas and babies and big Daddy bulls! Close enough to the window that I could have reached out and touched them. Now that was close enough for me....but what about those motorcycle riders going through this same herd. All was good, we shared the road....well they shared the road with us and on we went after several pictures were taken.
We ended up back on 16 retracing some of our steps from our arrival day but we did find the only grocery store we knew about in Hill City. We stocked up. The refrigerator was feeling quite neglected since it basically had a little bacon, salad, yogurt, and water in it.
Back at the campsite before dark, put the purchases away and there is still room in the frig for more....Jerry fixed supper out on the picnic table. The fellow next to us was also out cooking supper. In our talks with him this evening we found out he was here being a ranger for the season at Mt. Rushmore. A retired teacher, and tomorrow night he will give the presentation at the monument.
It is nearing midnight here and I am still up trying to finish the blog. I have tried to insert pictures to no avail. I will attempt again and if that doesn't work I'll add the link to the Wal-Mart site again. Way more pictures than most of you will want to see but the slide show can move quickly. :)
http://photos1.walmart.com/walmart/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=3975524003/a=3778787_3778787/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=walmart/
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